The Vagaries of Dating The Vagaries of Dating

I cannot pick a girl up at a bar. I have much more success at a party, and the most success at an intimate party. All of my long-term girlfriends were met through friends. Except my current one, who I met through Nerve personals. (God bless 'em.)

is Sex & the City really realistic at all in this respect?

For that kind of pick-up to work, you have to have more than I do -- looks, money, etc. Are you rich and chiseled? No? Then forget it. Don't watch so much TV.

i know you are being fatuous but i dont think this is true at all. somebody who is not 'attractive' is more likely to be more suspicious and closed off.

as for public space, a friend of mine just got back from paris and she says the rules are very different there - the street, public transport, the park, anywhere really, are all seen as acceptable domains for the pursuit of 'dates'

I am totally going to start prefacing all my sentences with this.

i am not!

I took the back way home a couple months ago, and drove right by the School for the Blind as hey were loading into their limos for prom. They were hot. I mean, all of them. Girls, guys... all of them looked like movie stars. I was stunned.

i am outraged - i don't come here to be insulted

''as for public space, a friend of mine just got back from paris and she says the rules are very different there - the street, public transport, the park, anywhere really, are all seen as acceptable domains for the pursuit of 'dates'''

how nice. I'm definetely in the wrong side of the channel.

As far as the tube/park/ anywhere but bars: I don't think there is a a definite ans on the question of 'can you even ask?'. I think some girls might be ok with handling a situation like that whereas could be offended if someone asked. that's the way i'd think abt it but i've never done it. But that's the kind of thing that gives the fear.

i know i was being fatuous but thats the one i was after

Dick,
There ain't much sw activity around O'Hare. I would check Mannheim between Belmont and North, there are occasional wsw's on that stretch in the early AM. Take a drive into the apartment area just north of Grand on the west side of Mannheim, I think that's where they come from. Albeit rare, but I usually see one once every couple weeks around there. Never the same one though.

I never get to Maywood, but I've heard that St. Charles Rd has some frequent bsw activity. (east of 1st Ave?).

But if I were asking for help, I'm sure this would not be helping.

however, it can be a bit creepy if people are too lecherous on the tube or bus. just smile at someone first, to see if they're even interested in making eye contact.

If N. didn't consistently use this line, he would never date.

Meaning he does date? But you've always insisted otherwise.

Like I say, fingers burnt myself, hope it's someone else mate.

in what way is victoria to stokie a heart?

I owe her a drink, too! She'll be getting loaded for free at this rate.

the benefits of buying rounds for everybody when you're already drunk!

i'm not trying to be a dick, but some of you guys seem a bit neurotic about all this! dating doesn't really have to be so fraught with angst you know. simply ignore advances/okcupidmessages from obvious psychos or dullards, flirt back with/answer advances/messages from people who seem cool and worth a few minutes of your life to interact with. when you meet someone you think is cute and interesting, you exchange numbers, you get together for lunch or coffee once, where you know there's no chance in hell of spending more than an hour or two together, basically to further suss out attraction levels and filter for stalker-y/psychosis red flags. if low-key test date is fun, you go out, have some drinks, conversation, see what happens. some dates work out ok, some don't go that great, once in a blue moon you meet someone you really really click with and its awesome. but that's much less likely to happen if you don't slog through some less-than-perfect dates first. an awkward date wont kill you ya know.

^^^ all this does out the window when you're freshly divorced. i've been on both ends and it just comes with the territory. you get a year or 2 to deal with it, then it's time to suck it up and get out there again already. a few awkward dates and some casual sex seems to help the process move along.

thx messiahwannabe

Haha, I had no idea that either of you "owed" me a drink. The more inebriated I am, the more generous I get. I guess that's better than drunkenness bringing out some latent stinginess?

gaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah

dating trouble?

now that I am drunk, I will say. lady I have been friends with forever, after a party sort of event at her place, says let's go to my room and listen to music. I figure she is sleepy, prepare to say goodnight and go home, and she is like "I planned this entire event in order to get you in my bed, you should stay." how can I be an adult and not notice such things? she thought I wasn't interested, I thought the same, people are so stupid. well, me. she is clearly awesome.

Wow mayzing

doesn't sound like much in the way of 'vagaries' tbh

it was for me

respect. sounds pretty awes though.

yeah seems like it's working out for you!

"I planned this entire event in order to get you in my bed, you should stay."

a+++

hope she said it with a semicolon tho

I dunno, is this a better place to maybe discuss this?

Firstly, that we only name it "animal lust" when we are powerfully attracted to someone who is wrong for us in every way. When we feel powerfully attracted to someone who ticks all the other boxes, we call it "true love" or "head over heels" or something else, because it's appropriate desire. The animal lust is what we call desire which is inappropriate.

But I was actually trying to compare and contrast two slightly different things. I've reread this Lisa Diamond book on sexuality this past weekend and it seemed like it supported her theory that there are two different (though related) mechanisms of desire. That one she called Proceptivity which is mostly internally-driven and hormonal because one is feeling horny (and if it wasn't this person at work triggering it, it would be some attractive person in a shop near me, or a random person on the internet, but I'd still just be externalising something which was originating in me.) And the other is Arousability, which is that process by which becoming intimate with someone and getting to know and trust them and you start to think that they are the most amazing person on earth - and then once you have started thinking "this person is awesome" up pop feelings of desire which are based on being aroused by that person.

Sorry, I should have spelled that out better. I have a bad habit of dropping in jargon I've recently picked up which puts a name to a thing I've been thinking about and noticing for a while, but didn't know there was a name for, and then assuming that everyone else has been reading the same books/blogs/press/etc and knows what I'm talking about.

(I've been having having trouble detangling feelings of "I'm getting to know this person and I like them, but I'm not sure which way it's going" for one person I've been seeing, from feelings of "OMG, lluuuusssstttt" for someone completely inappropriate and kind of wanted to talk through varying types of desire and how to process them. Because it's been a long, long time since attempting to do that, for me.)

Didn't know where else to put this.

Watching the new season of First Dates last night and its the usual C4 bollocks of cloaking people's potential humiliation as an experiment although there is some funny-ish at times moments.

Anyway, why did we have to get the opinion of the staff? How lame an idea was that?!?!

what's cool is when you have a seemingly really great date - which never happens - and then don't hear a word of reply when you later inquire about a second. uuuuugh

in conclusion, unquestionably bad dates >>> mysteriously unfruitful good ones

dating is perhaps the worst experience ever known, which is why i've swore to live a life of solitude

^^^gets it

doesn't get it

I'm tryna date now it's weird but for once in my life I'm not threatened by the weirdness

i think i overheard a coupla college kids out on a coffee date the other night, i'm not sure. it didn't sound very romantic, more like they were reviewing their sexual and drug use histories to determine whether they would sleep together

#figuringOutHowToLive

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CLvMpBnVEAA5piw.png

makes u think

A research scientist at Indiana University's Kinsey Institute for Research in Sex, Gender, and Reproduction couldn't possibly be wrong about that, what with that classy Oxford comma and everything.

So like three weeks ago I was at a cafe, sitting next to v attractive and interesting woman who was on a date with some dude. I kept wistfully thinking "why can't I meet people like that", but then a week ago I saw her on OkCupid and immediately messaged her, and now am about to meet her this evening. Anyways, I'm not sure if telling her this story at some point (like, not immediately) would come across as a) totally endearing or b) totally creepy.

maybe after you marry her

I would very much like to know what became of EDB!

As shitty as dating via dating apps is, attempting it without one is a trial all its own. I've been "out" twice with this girl I had met before via shared interests but never really hung out with properly, took a chance and asked her to a film event (I know movies tend to make for the shittiest dates but it's the most obvious mutual touchstone as she has an advanced degree in film studies), a nice time was had but no firm followup plans were made, nor any outright overtures I could detect. Then we met up a second time a couple of days back - another movie, followed by drinks and about three hours of the most engaging conversation I'd had in a long time. On the way home (same direction), there's slightly more intimacy, but was it just the cocktails? Years of singlehood teaches you to doubt every potential sign. Anyway we have plans to catch Let the Sunshine In but it'll probably take at least two weeks since has a busy night-work schedule and I might lose my mind in the interim.

this sounds very promising! just chill out and stop using words like 'touchstone' imo

you have and may continue to do cool things together! let the intimacy take care of itself

yeah I guess I shouldn't be so neurotic about it, it's just a natural side effect of not doing any real dating for basically a decade

this sounds nice! ride the wave imo, wherever it leads seems like it'll be a good place

EDB is ed b. iirc?

this sounds nice! ride the wave imo, wherever it leads seems like it'll be a good place

ime this is never the case but I earnestly appreciate the optimism!!

The ending of Let the Sunshine In should be a good lead in for drinks on a 3rd date.

Good luck Simon. sounds positive

you can do it simon.

Go Simon!!!

I had a stellar day with a lady Friday and I look forward to the next time. I’m patient and not pushing things too hard but I take it as a good sign that she stayed up with me from early afternoon to midnight /)

I am about to tell you an epic tale about subterfuge, dating in the 21st century and the fall of human civilization. This actually happened to me and it could happen to you too. Get some popcorn. *Thread*

— миша (@bvdhai) August 19, 2018

completely nuts

PS my thing went nowhere lol

saw that earlier via max tundra retweeting an ilxor, which felt weird

Max Tundra is extremely online

Emily Witt writes well on Feeld, online dating during and post- pandemic, with a couple of lines on Roe. All pretty well handled.

https://www.newyorker.com/culture/annals-of-inquiry/feeld-dating-app-sex

Though it could've been better if someone from The Queer community wrote it but that's not The New Yorker.

Nothing is enjoyable anymore.

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2023/jul/22/is-housing-crisis-killing-romance-modern-dating-jane-austen

Obviously it's all very middle-class. Partners can't get out of abusive relationships due to scarcity of a safe, affordable space. But you can see this stuff extending through society.

this has been "a thing" in the SF Bay Area for quite a while. ... the article definitely has that middle class focus, (to the point where I lost patience with it) but the housing crisis/relationship "stuck-ness" is harder on poorer people.

It's another category of gofundme campaign now ... along with "help pay medical bills" ... that is a clear example how broken "the system" is.

Sarahell otm. Of course everything is harder on poorer people, and one still hears the standard advice "well, then don't be poor."

Yeah I couldn't finish that piece either.